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Boom! Buffy the Vampire Slayer fans may now officially start foaming at the mouth: Sarah Michelle Gellar is coming back to TV, and she's ready to kick some ass again. Vulture has learned that CBS just gave a pilot greenlight to Ringer, an hourlong thriller that will star the ex-Slayer as a troubled young lass on the run from the mob. She assumes the life of her wealthy twin sister, only to find out that said sibling has a bounty on her head as well. If we're understanding this right, SMG will actually get to play both roles, which could be all sorts of fun. Ringer is from Supernatural writers Eric Charmelo and Nicole Snyder; Gellar will serve as a co-executive producer on the project, which is being produced by ABC Television Studios and CBS Television Studios. It's Gellar's first TV show since Buffy left the air in 2003. She had been attached to an HBO project that didn't work out and has mostly been focusing on other small features in recent years, but most importantly her family.

The networks have been on a pilot-greenlighting tear lately. But which possible show has the potential to be a gem of the 2011-12 season? We’ll go out on a limb here: CBS’ in-the-works thriller Ringer, which—should the pilot get the pickup to series during May’s network upfronts—would mark the much-anticipated return of Buffy the Vampire Slayer star Sarah Michelle Gellar to regular series television. Granted, Gellar acolytes have been titillated by her possible return before with HBO’s The Wonderful Maladys, only to have the pilot never make it to series. But alas, the potential seems to be there with Ringer. Until now, the show has only been described as drama about “a troubled young woman on the run who hides out by living the life of her wealthy twin sister, until she learns her sibling’s life has a bounty on it as well.” Rather vague. Are you dying for more details? Us, too, so we tracked down Peter Traugott, the pilot’s producer and head of Brillstein Entertainment Partners, the production company behind Ringer, and grilled him about the pilot. Here, Traugott spills more about Ringer’s plot, its enviable star Sarah Michelle Gellar and getting her to come back to network television (she wanted to do cable!), and why the show is indeed a good fit for CBS.

WHAT IS RINGER EXACTLY? “It’s a thriller, for sure,” Traugott explains. “It’s an edgy thriller about redemption and about revenge. There’s a point of view of two twin sisters who grew apart over a tragedy in their past. And one now seeks redemption and the other one seeks revenge. The sister who is seeking redemption has had a much more troubled life. When her fancy pants sister disappears, she takes over her life. She’s living the life of her more successful sister only to come to find out that her life is equally as fraught with danger and complication. Her sister dies in a boating accident. The other sister takes on her persona, only to come to find out that they have a hit out on her.”

WHY CAST SARAH MICHELLE GELLAR? HOW’D YOU GET HER TO COME BACK TO NETWORK TV? “Sarah had started thinking about coming back to TV a couple of years ago and she really wanted it to be something in cable,” Traugott explains. “In part just because of the subject matter you’re able to do in cable. But network television now has cracked that door a little bit and they’ve obviously been doing great stuff in network—and great stuff in cable. Both places are great. And this was a spec script that we had found and my colleague, Rachel Kaplan, had found by these young writers [Eric Charmelo and Nicole Snyder of The CW's Supernatural] and we flipped for it. Sarah’s manager got it to her, and she fell in love with the piece, too. We had been talking about this group for over a year trying to figure this out. For Sarah, she wasn’t really sure about network just because she wasn’t sure she would get what she wanted. When CBS read this thing and flipped for it and loved Sarah for it, that kind of started her thinking about being more open-minded to doing network because of the subject matter and this piece that she was so excited about.”

DOES GELLAR PLAY BOTH SISTERS ROLES? Yes! “She plays two characters: One is Bridget, the sister who takes over Siobhan’s life—Siobhan’s the other sister. The sisters reunite after having been estranged for a long time, and when they reunite, Siobhan dies. She falls…you know, in a boating accident.” So it’s like Hayley Mills of Lindsay Lohan in The Parent Trap and its more modern remake? “Yeah,” Traugott admit, with a laugh. “That’s kind of a comedic reference, and a reference old old Westerns—yeah, Sarah’s playing both roles.”

IF SIOBHAN DIES EARLY, DO WE SEE HER IN FLASHBACKS—OR WHAT? Yes, exactly. “You’ll see her that way. Not necessarily tonally nor stylistically, but the show comparable to Damages. I love Damages—by the way, it’s my favorite show—but in the same way that Damages tells part of the story in the present, through the past. Not just flashbacks but through actual stories in the past. That’s what’s happening here. Hopefully if we go to series, the audience will come to understand what the fall out was between Siobhan and Bridget. Why Siobhan would never want to see her sister again, why Bridget was in a kind of dark place in her life—all that stuff will be told as we move forward in Bridget’s stories through flashbacks with Siobhan.

WILL BUFFY FANS BE PLEASED WITH THIS ROLE FOR GELLAR? Duh: yes! “For the Buffy fans, she wanted part of what she initiated. As a matter of fact, her and her manager know this, but I know one thing she wanted to guard against was making sure that she whatever she does in TV, she does something that her fans who had grown up loving Buffy will also be excited about. And we think this show has that quality to it.

HOW WILL THIS PLEASE BUFFY FANS EXACTLY? “It’s a very different show. I mean, Buffy is so specific and a great, cool genre piece,” Traugott says. “But in the same way with Sarah, I think what’s remarkable about her as an actor—and very few people have this ability—she can play both sides well. If you remember Cruel Intentions, she was the villain, but you found yourself kind of rooting for her anyway. That’s what we’re looking for. How do we find something where her character has some edge, there’s some darkness to her, she doesn’t always do the right thing, but at the end of the day, you’re also rooting for her? And that’s what we were looking for in this. Obviously, Buffy was a hero, a kick-ass hero, and we wanted to be true to that with Sarah.”

IS GELLAR’S BRIDGET SUPPOSED TO BE A HEROINE? “It’s not like that, no,” Traugott clarifies. “I wouldn’t say that. It’s not that kind of a show. It’s more of a thriller. But we think it shows a lot of different layers to Sarah, and her character is so interesting and compelling. Very different from the Buffy character, but there’s a lot there for the audience to grab onto.

WHAT’S THE FORMAT? PROCEDURAL? SERIALIZED? “There’s an overriding arc that the writers have kind of figured out for the first several seasons, if we get so lucky,” Traugott says. “But there’s an overriding arc in part of Bridget’s drive of trying to figure out who is trying to kill Siobhan and now her, in Siobhan’s shoes. And week in and week out we will be telling episodic stories, relationship stories, hopefully wish-fulfilling kind of stories, because she is living this kind of fantastical life all the while trying to figure out who’s after her. She’ll be with Siobhan’s husband, which is obviously new to her because she’s in a relationship with a man she doesn’t know but he thinks he knows her. She’ll be dealing with Siobhan’s friends, and they’ll be trying to kind of safe-crack this mystery.”

WHAT OPENED THE DOOR FOR A SHOW LIKE THIS ON CBS? HOW DOES IT FIT THAT BRAND? “You know, to read the script, you would not have thought CBS, but I think when [CBS’ entertainment president] Nina Tassler and her team read it and flipped for it, and we came in and talked about it, they had passion for this. They talk a lot about The Good Wife and how, a couple of years ago, you wouldn’t have thought that the The Good Wife was a CBS show. But you go from a CSI kind of a show—a pure procedural—to The Good Wife, which has a procedural element but it’s obviously very character-driven and has a lot of great story and characters on it. Hopefully, if we do it right, Ringer can be the next evolution of that. That is, on paper it’s not necessarily a CBS show but worked exceedingly well in that Good Wife way.”

WHAT’S THE PILOT’S PRODUCTION SCHEDULE LIKE? “We’re just ramping up now where we’re getting into casting, we’re getting into pre-production stuff, we’re getting into director,” Traugott says. “All of our stuff is starting now. The goal would be to shoot—you know, like all the other pilots—sometime in early to mid March.”
WHY IS GELLAR PERFECT FOR THIS ROLE? “I’m just a fan of Sarah’s,” Traugott says. “I’m excited that there’s a piece of material she’s excited about and obviously as a producer, I wanna get this show on the air, and as a big fan of Sarah’s, I just want to watch her on TV again. It seems like America wants to, and it seems like CBS was a fan from what I saw. Hopefully if we do our jobs right we’ll have an opportunity. We’re excited. She’s iconic.”

LOST alum Nestor Carbonell is set to co-star opposite Sarah Michelle Gellar in the CBS drama-pilot Ringer. The project centers on troubled young woman Bridget (Gellar) who, while on the run from the mob, hides out by inhabiting the life of her wealthy twin sister, until she learns that her twin’s life has a bounty on it as well. Carbonell, repped by Paradigm and Thruline, will play an FBI agent in charge of keeping Bridget safe so she can testify against the mob who tracks her down and gets to know her "sister."

Now, we need you readers to put on your thinking caps because the show's premise is a bit confusing. Gellar will play two characters, twins named Bridget and Siobhan. Bridget is on the run from the mob and inhabits her wealthy sister Siobhan's life after Siobhan's death. Turns out (as it so often does) that her twin sister also has a price on her head.

Polaha's part in all this awesome madness? He'll be playing the out-of-work husband of Siobhan's best friend (Tara Summers) who is having an affair with Siobhan. He is confused and hurt by her behavior after Bridget takes over Siobhan's identity (he obviously doesn't know this) and tells her she must choose between him and her husband (Ioan Gruffudd).

What do you think of Polaha's new role, Zappers? We won't lie, we may have jumped up and down in the Zap2it offices when we heard the news.

It won't be long now before The CW is showering fans with footage and photos of Sarah Michelle Gellar's upcoming return to television, but, for now, there is one small taste of "Ringer."

USA Today points us to the first released image from the new drama, originally developed for CBS and snatched up by The CW when CBS passed.

As most acquainted with the project know by now, "Ringer" stars Gellar as, Bridget, a woman who hides from the mob by pretending to be her estranged twin sister, Siobhan -- who also has a price on her head.

The photo includes co-star Ioan Gruffudd ("Fantastic Four"), who plays the Siobhan's suspicious husband, so it's anybody's guess as to which sister we're looking at. (Gellar plays both characters in the pilot.)

The highlights: Sarah Michelle Gellar’s much-awaited return to television finds her on a very familiar night. Ringer will air 9/8c on Tuesdays, the same night Buffy the Vampire Slayer staked claim to during its run on CW predecessor The WB.

Taking the place of a twin sister sound really generic, but I'll give it the benefit of the doubt.

Quote:

Originally Posted by james0246

I want this to be good, but, as Irkalla has alluded to, the plot sounds fairly ridiculous, if not outright stupid. I'll still watch the first few episodes, but right now I am not impressed.

I like the theme of the show trough, I know this plot has been used before and it may seem 'stupid', but it has been some time since this kind of show was created. Anyway all I can say is to watch the first couple of episodes and bring your own conclusion Trough since CW (looking at their history) has the show I can aspect some great success for this show.

Sarah Michelle Gellar talks new show 'The Ringer,' returning to TV, and her 'Buffy' fans

by Sandra Gonzalez

We all remember: Buffy saved the world… a lot. But in her new CW show, The Ringer, Sarah Michelle Gellar’s characters are mostly trying to save themselves. That’s right, characters. Identical twins to be exact. In the series, Gellar plays a woman, who, after witnessing a murder, goes on the run and hides out by assuming the life of her wealthy identical twin sister — only to learn that her sister’s seemingly idyllic life is just as complicated and dangerous as the one she’s trying to leave behind, according to the logline released by the network.

For Gellar, who has largely been absent from the television landscape since Buffy the Vampire Slayer went off the air in 2003, playing two characters was just about the only thing she hadn’t done in her seven seasons on the UPN/WB show. “With Buffy, I got to do so much,” the actress told EW this morning at the CW Upfront presentation. “So what do you do next? What do you do that an audience hasn’t seen you do? But bringing to life two characters and making them different, but at the same time interesting, and [showing] the similarities is definitely a challenge I’ve never done.”
Gellar admits that her long time away from television was largely due to her judiciousness. ”I have the greatest fans in the world, and I loved my show. I think sometimes, too, you need that time to understand that that it was a cultural phenomenon, a legacy,” she said. “I want to honor those people who were so good to me and show them something worthy of their time and worthy of them. I think it was worth the wait.”

The real judge of the show’s success will likely come when residents of the Whedon-verse get a chance to weight in. Gellar’s confident they’ll be on board. She says, “[Buffy] was a world. And the CW is very good at creating a world and a universe.”

Her favorite part of the Ringer‘s world? The surprises. “This is the person who in the middle of The Sixth Sense yelled out, ‘Oh my, God! He’s dead!’” Gellar says about herself. “Usually I see it coming, and I didn’t see [Ringer's plot twists] coming.”

The CW announced its 2011-2012 schedule today which includes the return of Sarah Michelle Gellar to series television in the new drama "Ringer." Here's the full line-up:

The CW Network unveiled the schedule for its 2011-2012 season today at its annual upfront presentation for advertisers, affiliates and national media from Jazz at Lincoln Center. Electro hip-hop group LMFAO staged a rousing flash mob dance and performed their hit song “Party Rock Anthem” to open the show. The announcement was made by Dawn Ostroff, President of Entertainment, and Mark Pedowitz, the new President of The CW.

“We’re thrilled to present the most exciting primetime schedule The CW has ever had, comprised of shows that feature bold concepts, proven TV stars and up-and-coming, breakout talent,” said Ostroff. “In just five years, we’ve built an instantly recognizable brand that resonates with both viewers and advertisers and is known for being smartly provocative, culturally current, emotionally authentic and a leader in digital and social media. This upcoming season will continue to establish The CW as a premier destination for our viewers, especially women.”

“Our priority this season was adding more original programming this upcoming year, and we’ve done that with shows that will appeal to our core audience of women, while also bringing in new viewers,” said Pedowitz. “We’re being aggressive with smart, bold scheduling moves designed to improve key time periods and grow our audience.”

“‘Hart of Dixie,’ from the ‘Gossip Girl’ team of Josh Schwartz and Stephanie Savage, is a medical franchise with a proven star in Rachel Bilson,” added Pedowitz. “Sarah Michelle Gellar has incredible appeal to our core audience and beyond, and when word got out that she was starring in ‘Ringer’ on our network, it went viral online immediately. ‘The Secret Circle’ is from Kevin Williamson, the producer of ‘The Vampire Diaries,’ and is also based on a popular series of books by author L.J. Smith, and it fits perfectly on Thursday nights. Our new reality series ‘H8R,’ and ‘Re-Modeled’ and ‘The Frame’ at midseason, are brash and loud, and continue our commitment of giving our audience more original content all season long. And we’re thrilled to have ‘One Tree Hill’ return for its farewell season this spring. The 2011-2012 season is poised to be The CW’s best season yet.”

RINGER, starring Sarah Michelle Gellar, who stars as a woman on the run, who assumes her twin sister’s identity, only to discover that her sister’s life is just as complicated and dangerous as the one she’s trying to escape.

That's horrible! I mean, the plot didn't have a long life so they probably should have made it one season but still... it was a good show with great acting. Some of it was a little stretched in the second half but it was still good.